


all my heroes (have now become ghosts)

by antisepticdork



Series: sometimes i don't know who i am (i used to hold your hand) [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Amnesia, Angst, Brainwashing, Bucky is MESSED UP, Hurt/Comfort, I loved this movie so much, M/M, Memory Loss, Mentions of canon character death, Mild Language, Past Stucky, Past Torture, Post Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, STUCKY IS EVERYWHERE, but Steve tries to fix that, future stucky, with love and Sam's food
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-06
Updated: 2014-05-07
Packaged: 2018-01-23 19:24:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1576760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antisepticdork/pseuds/antisepticdork
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky’s face is gaunt and covered in stubble, and he licks his chapped lips. His voice is rusty from disuse when he speaks: “Why do you call me that?”</p><p>Thanks to the cutout in the top of Bucky’s right glove, Steve can see the hand stamp that looks like Captain America’s shield against his skin. That means he’s been through the exhibit, and Steve thinks he knows what he’s really asking. He can’t help it—a faint smile tugs at his lips as he replies, “You never liked James. Said it sounded pompous.”</p><p>Bucky cocks his head. “Usurper,” he mutters. “Supplanter, deceiver.” His mouth curls in a grimace. “Maybe that’s what you should call me now.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Uh... hi there. This is my first time posting anything in the Marvel fandom and I'm both super excited and super nervous. But I had so many feels and knew I HAD to write something after seeing CA: TWS for the second time, so this fic was born. If this goes well, I had an idea for another story that I might write... I really, really want this to go well. /fingers crossed.
> 
> I know the following fic may seem like a simple solution to a vastly complicated problem (BUUUCKY), but I love these boys so much and I wanted to give them a sliver of a happy ending, or at least a light at the end of the damn tunnel. I've read so many wonderfully angsty versions of what could happen after the movie - some truly brilliant writers in this fandom, oh my God. I hope you guys enjoy this nonetheless.
> 
> Title is from "Heroes" by Shinedown.

The Winter Soldier burns his armor in a D.C. neighborhood where dumpster fires aren’t uncommon.

He took the clothes he’s wearing from a laundry line strung between two houses. They’re damp and smell of detergent, but the T-shirt and jeans feel less cumbersome than leather and Kevlar. He keeps his boots, two handguns, and his knives. The boots stay on his feet and the handguns go into the inner pockets of the jacket he stole off an unoccupied café chair. He hides the knives in various places on his body, aware of their presence like a second skin. On his way here, he broke into the bathroom at a gas station to wash himself and change; he doesn’t care what he smells or looks like, but he must blend in to complete his goal.

He discovered a wallet in a pocket of the stolen jacket and bought a bottle of lighter fluid and a Bic from a hardware store. On impulse, he also picked up a pair of fingerless work gloves and a plain baseball cap. He could have acquired the items without paying for them, but a voice in his head that sounded like the man on the bridge had said, _no, Buck, that ain’t right_ , and the Winter Soldier had found himself accepting a paper receipt with his flesh hand.

That arm still hurts, but the broken bones have mended enough over the past ten days for him to use it. Until now he’s been spending most of his time holed up in abandoned warehouses or foreclosed homes, going out at night to steal food and waiting for his body to heal. Waiting to see if anybody would come and find him—HYDRA or SHIELD or… someone else. Nobody did.

He shoves the remaining cash into another pocket of the jacket and drops the receipt and the wallet in the dumpster on top of the empty lighter fluid bottle, then tosses the open Bic in after it. The flames start almost instantaneously, and he’d like to rip off his metal arm and watch it burn—it’s nothing but a reminder of being a tool, a killer, a _monster_ —but he knows that would leave him vulnerable.

And he can’t be vulnerable, not yet.

First he has to learn everything he can about the man on the bridge.

He tries to think of it like a new mission and not a foreign sense of curiosity.

The Winter Soldier has to know why he sees that face every time he blinks, why that voice is inching through his brain like it has always belonged there and never really left. He needs to know why he couldn’t bring his fist down for the final blow, why those words ( _I’m with you ‘til the end of the line_ ) stopped him in his tracks, a vise gripping his chest and his throat swelling shut. He wants to know why watching that red, white and blue uniform tumble into the Potomac felt as agonizing as every wipe and beating and manipulation he’s experienced.

He isn’t going to accomplish anything in front of a burning dumpster, so he shoves his gloved hands in his pockets and walks away, out of the alley and into a street recently dampened by a late spring shower. It takes a block and a half for the neighborhood to change, ratty walk-ups and burned-out husks replaced by storefronts and modern apartments.

On his way to nowhere in particular, the Winter Soldier passes a shop with art supplies displayed in a window, and wonders why his right-hand fingers itch with the urge to buy a gift.

 

~***~

 

He walks for a long time, and eventually ends up near the National Mall. There’s an advertisement plastered to the side of a metro bus for an exhibit at the Smithsonian Museum about the life of Captain America. _One week left to experience the legacy of history’s greatest hero!_

_The man on the bridge_ , the Winter Soldier thinks, and gets on the bus as it grinds to a halt at the corner.

When the bus reaches its destination he disembarks along with a bunch of oblivious tourists. There are three distinct sub-groups—Indian, Chinese, and German—and though they all chatter in their native tongues he can understand them perfectly. The last of the dialects makes his skin tighten, and before he knows what’s happening he’s doubled over with memories of bombs falling from the night sky and pain and a cold metal cell.

He recalls repeating a rank and a name and a number that are meaningless now, but that’s what you’re supposed to do when you get captured. Of being strapped to an operating table with no way out, knowing he’d rather be riddled with bullets a dozen times over than die as a guinea pig for a group of crazy scientists. He remembers thinking that the world was on fire but he wouldn’t live to see it burn, and then—then he saw those blue eyes framed by long lashes, looking at him like he hung the fuckin’ moon and stars, and that guileless, bashful smile.

The Winter Soldier— _Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes, you Nazi piece of_ —doesn’t realize he’s on his knees until he feels a hand on his flesh shoulder and has to look up to see the people crowded around him. They’re an odd mix of an older man, a male jogger, and a businesswoman.

The old man is wearing a hat that says he fought in the Korean War and he asks Barnes if he’s a veteran; he nods in answer, suddenly unable to speak. The businesswoman digs around in her large handbag. Barnes tenses, expecting a weapon, and is surprised when a plastic-wrapped sandwich is pushed into his hands. She flashes him a sympathetic look before striding away in her high heels. The jogger gives him a mostly-full water bottle and crosses the street, and the Korean vet helps him over to a bench and pats his shoulder a final time before continuing his walk.

Barnes barely has the wrapper off the sandwich before he’s tearing into it with his teeth, unable to remember the last time he ate something that wasn’t stale or moldy.

As he’s chugging the water he’s hit by a memory of a blond boy with a concave chest having a rare good day—no bone-rattling coughs or weird heartbeats—and scarfing down everything in front of him with vigor. He hears somebody saying _you don’t have to wolf it down, Stevie—more where that came from_ , even though it meant he’d go hungry that night.

Barnes realizes with a start that that voice belonged to _him_ , and his metal hand clenches around the weak plastic of the empty bottle until it snaps. It takes effort to make his fingers straighten out, and something in his scarred shoulder aches. He leaves the trash piled neatly on the bench and mounts the steps to the Smithsonian, keeping his shoulders hunched against the idea that the wall HYDRA installed in his mind is beginning to crumble.

He has no idea if it’s a good thing or not.

 

~***~

 

When Steve decided he’d go back to the Smithsonian one last time before he and Sam left the city in search of Bucky, the last thing he expected to find was the man himself hunched over on a bench outside the museum.

There’s no mistaking that’s who the trembling form is, though. Steve would know Bucky anywhere, in any lifetime, metal arm and long hair be damned.

But for a second, he doesn’t know what to do.

He glances around, searching for any sign that this is some kind of trap, worried about civilian casualties and aware of the empty space where his shield usually rests. It’s possible that some rogue HYDRA agents set this up, but he doesn’t think it’s likely that they’d just leave Bucky out in the open like this—he’s too valuable an asset.

Steve flinches away from that last thought, and when his eyes find Bucky’s rounded back again he decides that it doesn’t matter if this is a ruse. Carefully, he approaches the bench and sits down. There’s a foot or so of distance between them, but that’s for Bucky’s benefit, not Steve’s. He’d happily get stabbed again if it meant a moment of contact, of realism.

“Bucky?” Steve _aches_ when haunted, glassy blue eyes find his through a curtain of dark hair. There’s recognition in them now, but it’s unsure. “Mind if I join you?” he adds, kicking himself for not asking that first. _God, Steve, manners._

Bucky’s face is gaunt and covered in stubble, and he licks his chapped lips. His voice is rusty from disuse when he speaks: “Why do you call me that?”

Thanks to the cutout in the top of Bucky’s right glove, Steve can see the hand stamp that looks like Captain America’s shield against his skin. That means he’s been through the exhibit, and Steve thinks he knows what he’s really asking. He can’t help it—a faint smile tugs at his lips as he replies, “You never liked James. Said it sounded pompous.”

Bucky cocks his head. “Usurper,” he mutters. “Supplanter, deceiver.” His mouth curls in a grimace. “Maybe that’s what you should call me now.”

“To me you’ve always been Bucky,” Steve says, “and you still are. Whatever you’ve done, you did it when you were somebody else. Somebody you didn’t want to be.”

Anger flashes over Bucky’s face, twisting his features. He uncurls his body and looks as lethal and menacing as he did when they fought, only since he’s not bleeding out and half-blind from smoke Steve can see the war going on in his best friend’s eyes. Something makes a noise and he belatedly realizes that it’s Bucky’s cybernetic arm as the hand clenches into a fist.

“You mean that.” It isn’t a question. The words are shot through with disbelief and a hint of mocking. He studies him closely, and Steve is reminded of long-ago skeptical scrutiny he’d faced from countless doctors at recruitment centers. “Is it that simple for you?”

Steve’s wrestled with that question and come up with the same answer every time. “Yeah, it is.”

Bucky’s eyes narrow—obviously he’s looking for some sign of deception. “I killed your friend,” he says, voice flat. “Doesn’t that make you angry?”

Steve had suspected the Winter Soldier was responsible for the deaths of Howard and Maria Stark after what Zola showed him and Natasha at Camp Lehigh. Hearing it come out of Bucky’s mouth, though, feels like a blow to the gut. “Of course it does, Buck, but I’m not mad at you. If you had been yourself, you never would’ve done that—you knew Howard, liked him fine.” He leans forward, needing to be closer and knowing full well he might get another fractured eye socket. “He was your friend, and the Bucky Barnes I know doesn’t hurt his friends.”

“I hurt you,” Bucky points out.

“Did you want to?” Steve counters.

Bucky glances away, pinching the bridge of his nose with his flesh hand. When he speaks again his voice has some Brooklyn in it, and he looks as surprised as Steve feels: “You deliberately tryin’ to annoy the shit outta me?”

Steve grins, looks up at Bucky through his lashes. “Is it working?”

 

~***~

 

Warmth unfurls in Barnes’ chest when the man on the bridge—Captain America, _Steve_ —gets that expression on his face, like the ice that has surrounded his entire being for so long is slowly being melted away. He studies the expression, easily identifying joy, hopefulness… and something else, something he can’t help thinking that the old Bucky would recognize but this altered version of him does not.

The clouds recede and allow the sun to peek through, but its rays are nothing compared to the brightness of man in front of him.

Barnes squints in the sudden light. He hesitates, mouth dry, knows he can’t fuck this up but he has to say _something_ : “I’m not him. Your friend. I’m not… who he was.”

Steve shrugs, and Barnes remembers birdlike shoulders that fit easily under his arm, that used to shake with every hoarse cough and chilled shiver. He also remembers the shoulders Steve has now, groping at smooth skin for dear life as _Bucky_ trembled and shook, head thrown back in ecstasy with Steve’s lips and tongue and teeth against his neck—

Suddenly, Barnes _knows_.

He knows what that third thing was in Steve’s expression, never thought it was something he’d see directed at himself. He knows that it was more than brotherly affection—it was the kind of love they had grown up thinking two men couldn’t share, the kind of love that died but wasn’t buried the day James Buchanan Barnes plunged from a train in the Alps. It’s the kind of love that Barnes knows he doesn’t deserve now, and probably didn’t then.

Steve’s saying _it doesn’t matter, Buck, I just want you to be who_ you _are_ and Barnes can barely hear it over the ringing in his ears. His hands are shaking and he’s sweating, cold and clammy, and now Steve notices that something’s wrong, reaches out instinctually, out of habit—

Barnes bats Steve’s hand aside and springs to his feet, breathing harsh and rasping.

Steve rises too, hands raised in a gesture of harmlessness. “Bucky, what’s wrong? What did I do?”

Barnes’ gaze darts around, looking everywhere but directly at Steve, knows if he does the wall that’s in his head will split in half and he’s not sure what he’ll do if that happens. His eyes settle in the vicinity of Steve’s shoes, and his jaw works so hard he feels one of his molars crack.

“I need to think,” he says roughly, “and I can’t do it here. With you.”

“Okay,” Steve responds, and why the hell is everything so _easy_ for him? Moving slowly, he reaches into his back pocket and produces an index card, which he holds out between two fingertips. “This is my new address. I’m living with Sam—the guy with the wings?” _Who you sent into a death spiral_ is left unsaid, of fucking _course_ it is. “Just… I mean, take your time, but maybe you’d want to stop by later?” He chuckles self-deprecatingly. “I’m hopeless in the kitchen, but Sam makes great stuff.”

“You used to burn soup,” Barnes mumbles, a razor blade smile flickering on his face, making his lips feel odd as they stretch. “Who does that?”

They stare at one another for a beat or two, and then Barnes snatches the card, shoving it inside his jacket before turning on his heel and walking away. He feels Steve’s gaze on his back until he turns the corner.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow! I love this fandom - thank you so much to everyone who left kudos on this, it really means a lot. As promised, here's part two. I'm sorry in advance if the Russian translations aren't accurate, but we can blame Google Translate for that. Hope you enjoy it!

A couple of hours later, Sam Wilson rubs his forehead and wonders how this is his life.

“So let me get this straight,” he says after taking a long pull off his beer. They’re in the kitchen of his rented townhouse; it’s an upgrade from his last apartment and he likes it a lot. Steve likes it, too, so Sam—being the awesome friend that he is—invited him to stay over while his shot-up apartment gets patched up. “I’m all set to follow you on a ’round-the-world expedition to find your ninety-five-year-old best friend turned super-assassin, and you stumble across the guy sitting on a park bench and looking like a sad trash hobo?”

Across the island from him, Steve nods. He’s got his ridiculous body perched on a barstool and is fiddling with the label on his brewski. He told Sam he can’t get drunk the other day and by _God_ that is a tragedy—it’d be a very useful skill right now. “I probably shoulda told you before I invited him over, but I was afraid I wouldn’t get another chance. Sorry, man.”

The earnestness in his voice makes Sam wave off the apology, saying, “no big deal” while the rational part of his mind has an aneurysm. This is a bad idea, possibly _the worst idea ever_ , but if Steve has this much conviction when it comes to Barnes, then Sam’s sort of obligated to go with it, if a little more cautiously. He takes another sip of his beer and adds, “’Course, you know if he _does_ show up and he loses his shit, you’re buying whatever he breaks.”

Steve smiles, and they clink bottles. “Deal.” The pleased expression fades, and he says, “I still don’t know what happened. One minute, everything was fine—we were talking, and he seemed… okay, you know? And then something set him off, and I’ve got no idea what I was.”

Sam’s over by the sink now, filling a big pot with water for pasta. “Guy like Barnes, could be anything. Some people can get freaked by a leaf blowing down the street. Other people, it’s an engine backfiring. Might not have been something _you_ noticed, but it was enough to spook him.” He asks his next question bluntly: “Did he come at you?”

“No. I reached for him, and he… pushed me away. That was it.”

“Could be he remembered something,” Sam suggests. He sets the full pot on the hot stove and gets out a pan, putting it on another burner and moving to the counter to chop onions for sauce. “You’re one of the only connections he’s got to his past; not a stretch to imagine talking to you might’ve triggered something.” He shakes his head. “Shit, Cap—you’ve got me psychoanalyzing again and you aren’t even paying me.”

Before Steve can reply, Sam hears the Winter Soldier say, “I think that might be my fault.”

 

~***~

 

If Bucky—he’s decided that’s who he is, or who he’ll try to be because he doesn’t want to be _this_ anymore—wasn’t so busy being tense and uncomfortable, he’d think the reactions to his sudden entrance are funny. The man with the wings—Sam, Steve had called him earlier—yelps and sort of chucks the knife he’s holding over his shoulder. Bucky flinches when the potential weapon leaves his hand, but it embeds itself harmlessly in a cabinet door. Steve, meanwhile, has beer coming out of his nose and is cursing under his breath in a way that Captain America’s P.R. team probably wouldn’t appreciate.

Bucky holds up his hands in an, _I’m not here to kill you_ way, and tries to keep the sudden swoop of uncertainty he feels off his face. It’s harder than he expected without the mask; he’s discovered, mostly by accident, that James Buchanan Barnes’ features are naturally expressive.

Sam is slumped over with his hands on his knees and taking deep breaths. “Door,” he manages to say, gesturing toward the front of the house. “I have one. It works. Has a bell and everything.”

Bucky acknowledges that with a nod, then looks pointedly at the ceiling. “Bedroom window was unlocked.”

He shoots a disapproving look Steve’s way, and is oddly satisfied when the man looks abashed. “Gonna have to fix that,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. His face is still pink from coughing up beer, and the sight of that flush makes an odd tingling travel up Bucky’s spine. “M’glad you came, Buck—wasn’t sure you would.”

“Almost didn’t,” Bucky admits, and he’s got to watch out—telling Steve the truth feels too liberating, too cleansing, even if it’s something that small. He takes a step forward, every muscle still coiled to retreat. He glances at Sam and adds, “Wasn’t sure I’d be welcome.”

Wilson looks him up and down appraisingly, gaze flicking to Steve once before coming back to Bucky’s face. His eyes are dark like coal, glimmering with intelligence and humanity. Very deliberately, he retrieves the knife from the cabinet door, watching for an adverse reaction.

Bucky stares back at Sam and forces himself to remain still, suddenly hyperaware of his stolen clothes and his bloodstained combat boots, the way the hilt of the knife at the small of his back pinches his skin and the 9-mil in his pocket doesn’t sit right against his hip. He takes his hat off and clenches the bill in his metal hand, doesn’t particularly care if he gets this man’s approval but knows he needs it if he wants to be around Steve in this place.

Sam seems to reach a conclusion and makes a sweeping gesture with his arm. “Make yourself at home. Is it okay if I call you Bucky too?”

“Sure,” Bucky mutters, surprised that he’d bother to ask. He puts the hat on the counter—out of everything he’s wearing, it’s the cleanest—and takes the stool next to Steve’s. He wracks his shredded mind for something to say that’s polite, and goes with, “What are you making?”

“My nana’s spaghetti,” Sam replies. “Dinner of champions, or something like that.” He tips his head toward the refrigerator. “You want a beer?”

“Here, take mine,” Steve says immediately, and Bucky knows he should think it’s unnerving that Steve knew he wanted to say yes before he did, but he can’t bring himself to care. He’s so tired of calculating, second-guessing, always being suspicious of everything and everyone. “I’ll get another.”

So Bucky accepts the mostly-full bottle and watches Steve get up and pull a new one from the fridge. His movements are swift and coordinated, but not hurried, and Bucky knows this man shouldn’t be so relaxed around him. Sam is right to be cautious; he’s chopping tomatoes now with a practiced ease, but he’s watching Bucky through his peripheral vision and hasn’t touched his drink since Bucky’s arrival, not wanting to be impaired if the need to go on the defensive strikes.

Beside him, Steve seems to be vibrating with unasked questions. Finally, he utters the most obvious one, but the gentleness to his tone is unexpected. “How much do you remember?”

Bucky rests his metal hand against his thigh, bends each finger individually as he debates how to answer. “I see… pieces. Glimpses. Usually not like I’m in them so much as above them. Sometimes there’s no sound or feeling, other times that’s all I get.” He glances at Steve but can’t look for long—too bright, just like earlier. “Mostly, I remember you.”

“Yeah?” Steve shifts closer and it’s not threatening, so Bucky doesn’t move away. “Anything good?”

 _Too much_ , is the response on the tip of Bucky’s tongue, but he swallows the words along with a sip of hoppy, carbonated liquid. “You got beat up a lot.”

Over by the stove, Sam snorts quietly. Bucky doesn’t mind that he’s listening, because it means that this is _real_ , not some kind of twisted fantasy, not something his mangled consciousness has come up with to comfort him.

Steve nods, not seeming ashamed. “I did. You always came to my rescue.”

“Until I needed the rescuin’,” Bucky says after a pause, and barely registers the slightly obnoxious touch of Brooklyn in his words. “Then you went and ate that scrawny kid I used to live with and showed up lookin’ like that.”

“You didn’t believe it was me at first, I don’t think.” If Steve notices the accent he doesn’t show it. “I got you off that table and I’m pretty sure you thought you were seeing things.”

Bucky’s brow furrows. “That’s because I had been. That little ебарь, Zola, he had been giving me all kinds of drugs—wasn’t the first time I thought I saw you.” He feels it coming a second before it happens, thinks _no no no_ , but he’s on his feet again and moving, pinning Steve to the nearest wall by his throat and _shaking_ him, shouting, “ _Why_? Why are you always so _fucking_ important?” Then he’s screaming, the Russian syllables as unyielding as his grip: “ _почему я_ _вам нужен_?”

“Bucky,” Steve says, and that’s when Bucky realizes that he’s not strangling him, can’t get his flesh hand to close any further, can’t cut off the target’s blood flow or crush his trachea. The cold presence in the back of Bucky’s head curses at him for being weak, for not submitting and _finishing the mission_. Warns in chilling tones of what will happen if he doesn’t, the pain that will come, that always comes.

Steve’s hands are on his shoulders, not scrabbling or shoving, the tip of one thumb brushing against Bucky’s collarbone. The look on his face is rattled but determined, and he glances away from Bucky for a second—to warn off Sam, whom Bucky knows is pointing a gun he produced from a drawer at his head—before refocusing, his eyes and mouth soft at the edges despite the clench of his jaw.

“Bucky,” he repeats, like it’s the only thing he knows, and the Winter Soldier can hear that infernal word so many different ways, in every inflection from pleading to reverence, laughter to anguish. The body that it comes from may change, but the voice is always the same, and it’s what exploits the chinks in the barriers HYDRA built, what breaks Bucky down and makes him human again.

“ _Steve_ ,” Bucky chokes out, and his grip on Steve’s neck goes slack. His vision is blurry and his face feels wet, and at first Bucky wonders why his eyes are bleeding. But then Steve’s hand is on his face, and his thumb is wiping away tears—belatedly, Bucky realizes that he’s _crying_ , and he’s too fucked up to remember what that is. He makes a mournful noise, low in his throat, and hangs on to Steve’s outstretched arm with both hands. “Steve, Steve, _Steve_.”

Steve murmurs, “ _God_ , Buck,” and practically crushes him to his chest, and Bucky lets him, feeling simultaneously like he’s going to shrink in on himself and fly apart into a million pieces. He shakes, because he needs to, because he’s been so cold for seventy years and now he’s finally warm.

“I got you,” Steve says against his hair, warm breath ghosting the shell of his ear. Is it Bucky’s imagination, or is there wetness there, too? “I’ve got you, Bucky, and I’m not gonna let you go again.”

There’s silence from behind them, then a _clack_ as Sam sets the gun down on the countertop. “And I’ve got _you_ , pasta,” he mutters, turning back to the meal he’s preparing and giving them some privacy. “Now, where’s the goddamn colander?”

 

~***~

 

Later, Steve wishes he could’ve had the pleasure of meeting Sam’s grandmother, both to compliment her on her wonderful grandson and ask her how long it took her to perfect that spaghetti sauce. It’s easily the best he’s ever had and he’s not afraid to admit it. He’d had four large helpings and Bucky had devoured five, while Sam had looked on after his second with a hilarious mixture of awe and nausea.

Afterward, they sat on the couch—Bucky on the chaise, Steve in the middle, and Sam leaning against the arm—in the living room and channel surfed, avoiding news stations or anything violent. Those parameters had reduced them to a three-hour _Spongebob Squarepants_ marathon that left Steve fairly certain he’d be singing about pineapples under the sea in his sleep.

Sam went to bed a half-hour ago, but Steve knows he’s probably still up, reading or tinkering with his wings in the master bedroom. Steve’s been staying in the guest bedroom, which has a spacious on-suite. He offered it to Bucky, who had accepted and looked on warily until Steve showed him how the numerous faucet functions worked.

While his friend had been in the shower, Steve had changed into something more comfortable and hunted up some sweatpants and a T-shirt that he thought would be a decent fit for Bucky. Then he hung out until he heard the water shut off, retreating to let Bucky get dressed. He went around the house and did a quick perimeter-walk, checking locks and trying to steady his own nerves.

When he comes back to the room, Bucky’s wearing the clothes Steve set out and sitting on the edge of the bed, frowning like the mattress offended him somehow. His other outfit is folded neatly on the floor by the window, evidently deemed too dirty to be put on the furniture.

The expression on Bucky’s face is almost comical, and Steve can’t help but chuckle a little when he asks, “Something wrong?”

“It’s so… soft,” Bucky responds, still prodding the mattress with a flesh finger, eyebrows furrowed. He looks at Steve, and the sight of those eyes in this place, in this _time_ , keeps taking his breath away. “How can you stand it?”

“I manage.” Steve sits down next to Bucky, but leaves space between them. The gap is smaller than the last time, though, and he’s pleased when Bucky doesn’t flinch. “I’ll take the couch tonight—or you can, if you want. Whatever you’re comfortable with.”

Bucky chews at the inside of his lip and looks at the floor, damp hair hiding his face from view. He looks smaller, somehow, in the low light from the bedside lamp. “I… don’t really sleep.”

Steve’s noticed the dark circles under Bucky’s eyes—it’d be hard not to—and he asks quietly, “You got any idea why?” He’s thinking of nightmares or shitty living conditions, and isn’t expecting the answer he gets.

“I didn’t have to, unless I was on a mission that lasted more than a day,” Bucky says after a moment, like he started the sentence several times in his head but chose this version. “Then, I had to be ordered to. It never felt… right. Or safe.” There’s a whirring noise, and Bucky’s metal hand clenches. He looks up quickly, eyes skittering from Steve’s face to a point near his ear. “You weren’t there. I… didn’t know that was the reason, not then, but I do now.”

Steve swallows hard. “Bucky, I—” _I’m sorry, I’m so sorry I wasn’t there. I’m sorry I couldn’t look for you, I’m sorry I never came._

But Bucky plows on like he hasn’t spoken: “We used to do that a lot. Right?” He holds Steve’s gaze, now, something like hope glimmering in his eyes. The prosthetic fist is resting on his thigh and is pushing on it so hard it must be leaving a bruise, and the tension in his body is visible. “Sleep together, I mean.”

For a second Steve thinks that Bucky’s unaware of the double meaning behind his words, but no, that’s not it at all. He knows _exactly_ what he said, and Steve is equal parts overjoyed and at a loss, has no idea how to handle this. He blows out a breath and says haltingly, “Look, Buck—I got you back, that’s all I care about—I mean, I care about you getting better, obviously, but I didn’t think—I don’t expect—”

Suddenly, there are dry, chapped lips pressed against Steve’s, silencing whatever embarrassing thing that was going to fall out of his mouth next. It lasts about two seconds and is more than chaste, but it happens, and it fills him with a feeling of completeness that he was sure he had lost in another life. He brushes the back of Bucky’s metal hand with his fingers and feels the mechanisms unclench under his touch.

When Bucky leans back his eyes are wide, and for a terrifying moment Steve’s afraid he’s going to dive out the window and escape into the night. But then he smiles—the barest hint of an upward curl—and leans over to turn off the light. “You don’t have to sleep on the couch,” he says, and his mouth pulls down again in the near-darkness, like he’s bracing for rejection. “I doubt things get better when I sleep, though—I might wake you up.”

Steve shushes him, pushes and prods gently but allows Bucky move into the bed at his own pace. He waits until they get settled under the blankets to speak. “Wake me as many times as you want.” He touches his knuckles to the softness of Bucky’s right wrist but wouldn’t care if it was the other one. “I’m just glad you’re here.”

Bucky murmurs something that sounds like “M’glad I burned it,” and then drops into unconsciousness, as easy as pie.

Steve has no idea what that means, but he figures he’ll ask in the morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations:
> 
> ебарь - fucker
> 
> почему я вам нужен? - why do you need me? (Thanks to lady81bird for the fix-it!)
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
